When it is said
At the start of Matins a reader reads six psalms, and this is the third.
It was a morning psalm in the early Church too. An early book of church rules called the Apostolic Constitutions tells Christians to gather every morning and evening to pray, and to say this psalm in the morning.
Where it comes from
Author by tradition
In the wilderness of Judah
The psalm’s Hebrew heading says David sang it “when he was in the wilderness of Judah”. The old Greek translation of the psalms names the wilderness of Idumea instead. Either way he prays from a dry and weary land, remembering the sanctuary where he had seen God’s power and glory.
The Hebrew text with the 1917 JPS English, on Mechon-Mamre; Brenton’s English of the Septuagint, on eBible
Its words of trust, read twice
At Matins the reader reads the whole psalm, then goes back and reads its words of trust a second time. In the translator Isabel Hapgood’s 1906 service book they begin “In the night watches have I trusted in Thee” and end “My soul cleaveth unto Thee: and Thy right hand shall uphold me.”
St Athanasius’s advice
In a letter on the psalms, St Athanasius of Alexandria tells his reader what to do if he is hunted and has to flee into the desert. He should not be afraid, as if he were alone there, because God is there with him. He should rise early and sing this psalm to Him.
What the words mean
“I seek You at dawn”
The Hebrew verb for “seek” in the first line is formed from the word for dawn, and it also means to seek eagerly. So the King James Version reads “early will I seek Thee”, and the old Greek translation “I cry to Thee early”. Many newer Bibles, the Berean Standard Bible among them, read “earnestly I seek You”. This prayer keeps the morning sense.
Brown-Driver-Briggs and Strong’s on the Hebrew verb, on Bible Hub
Why the last verses are left out
The psalm has three more verses. In them David says that those who seek his life will go down into the depths of the earth, fall by the sword and become food for foxes, and that the king will rejoice in God. This prayer stops before them and ends on God’s right hand holding David up. The reading at Matins comes to rest there too.
The Scripture in it
O God, You are my God. Earnestly I seek You; my soul thirsts for You. My body yearns for You in a dry and weary land without water. So I have seen You in the sanctuary and beheld Your power and glory. Because Your loving devotion is better than life, my lips will glorify You. So I will bless You as long as I live; in Your name I will lift my hands. My soul is satisfied as with the richest of foods; with joyful lips my mouth will praise You. When I remember You on my bed, I think of You through the watches of the night. For You are my help; I will sing for joy in the shadow of Your wings. My soul clings to You; Your right hand upholds me.
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.